Pubs in Bengaluru's MG Road, Church Street to shut from July

Several five star hotels and high end pubs in MG Road, Brigade Road, Indiranagar and Church Street will shut following Supreme Court order banning sale of liquor within 500 metres of a national highway. In the record books, MG Road and Old Madras Roads are considered national highways. However, its the BBMP that maintains these roads. Bangalore Development Minister KJ George said the government will convince the Centre to denotify these roads.

Pubs and bars in the city’s central business district will have to pull down its shutters after June 30. This comes after the Supreme Court order which states liquor cannot be sold within 500 metres of the highway. What’s causing pub and bar owners more grief is the excise department’s refusal to renew licenses.

The excise department has cited the Supreme Court order and has refused to renew it. With just eight days to go, several five star hotels and high end pubs in MG Road, Brigade Road, Indiranagar and Church Street might have to relocate or the highways have to be denotified.

In the record books, the stretch from Basaveswara Circle to Raj Bhavan is officially known as a national highway. Apart from this, MG Road till Trinity Circle, before reaching Old Madras Road, is also known as a national highway. Another highway begins at Town Hall, passes through JC Road and leads to Hosur Road.

However, it is the city’s BBMP that’s maintaining these roads. The civic body’s mayor G Padmavathi said the government is in talks with the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) to officially hand over these roads to BBMP but there has been official communication, according to Times of India.

“Denotification of national highways is the Centre's prerogative. We are waiting for the response from the ministry of highways to the state government's request to denotify the selected stretches,” the publication quoted M Lakshminarayan, principal secretary, PWD, as saying.

Bengaluru Development Minister KJ George also said the government will convince the centre to denotify highways. However, liquor vendors feel the government should have acted sooner. G Honnagiri Gowda, president of Karnataka Wine Merchants Association, said the state government wasted time when the Supreme Court passed the order on March 30.

Following the top court’s order, 6,015 pubs were slated to close across Karnataka. The state government redesignated 1,476.69km of state highways under urban local bodies and managed to save 3,200.